I have ,my soil is as heavy as clay soil can get,my veggie garden took a lot work and compost to get it where it is today and as well as being clay it is sloping garden on a hill side with more sun in the front of the house than back,I have holly,hazel,Laurel ,fir,sumac,flowering red currant,forsythia oak,,Gunnera,,pyracantha,dogwood,clematis,hellebore,hawthorn,

it takes some effort but I grow a lot more than i have listed,its not easy soil.

I have all colours as like the cottage garden feel, others that have done well here is osteopernum , Veronica I have purple and pale pink, oriental poppies , foxgloves. I have been pleasantly surprised what has done well, shrubs have taken a battering though , I did lose red robin .

I think we are optimistic catnip and most of the time plants do grow. Then we get over ambitious and 'almost hardy in sheltered areas' gets stretched a little bit too far. And you know a plant likes well drained soil but yours isn't too heavy really etc.................

We definitely Re optimistic ....my gardening method is 'try it and see' a lot of my original plants came from my parents splitting plants from their gardening for me, even though their soil is very different they have thrived well here in some cases better . If I relied on should and shouldn't do from books I would never have tried.
Onwards with the trials and tribulations !
Bunny ...